


Use You As A Warning Sign

by Jiksa



Category: BBC Radio 1 RPF, One Direction (Band)
Genre: Active aggression, Angst, Gratuitous References to Chelsea Boots, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Passive-aggression, Seven Minutes In Heaven, Stupidity, Trapped In A Closet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-02
Updated: 2018-03-02
Packaged: 2019-03-16 10:14:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,181
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13634232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jiksa/pseuds/Jiksa
Summary: Nick and Louis get trapped in a closet for seven minutes in heaven/hell.





	Use You As A Warning Sign

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the [1D Short Fic Fest](https://1dshortficfest.tumblr.com). This took an absolute village to finish; my deepest gratitude to [Renlyne, ](https://archiveofourown.org/users/renlyne)[shiftylinguini, ](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shiftylinguini/)[Writcraft and ](https://archiveofourown.org/users/writcraft)[immoral_crow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/immoral_crow) for handholding/beta/britpicking/hugs. And thanks to the wonderful mods for running a fantastic fest!

“So.”

“Shut up.”

“Lou—”

“Shut the actual fuck up. I hate your face. Shut up.”

“Lovely,” Nick sighs in obvious exasperation, leaning back against the side of Harry’s walk in robe, his back cushioned by an array of stupid, flouncy silk shirts. He tips his face to the ceiling, as though seeking strength from above. “This is going to be a long seven minutes in heaven, then.”

Louis scoffs, leaning hard against the opposite wall with his arms crossed tightly over his chest. He kicks at a leopard-print Chelsea boot, irritated. “Hell, more like.”

Nick’s eyes cut to his, his brow furrowing in some sort of indignation. “Look, you didn’t have to come in here with—”

“What,” Louis snaps, “and risk the third degree about why I backed down from a dare? I’ve got a reputation to uphold.”

“Right,” Nick says shortly. Louis can almost hear him rolling his eyes. “God forbid anything compromise your precious reputation.”

Louis flushes; something about Nick’s proximity always twists everything up inside him, making him say all the wrong things in all the wrong ways. “Shut up.”

“Again, lovely.”

Shrieking laughter echoes from the living room and Louis feels a horrible, sick anxiety swell in his belly. They’re all off their tits out there, the impromptu game of _truth and dare_ Harry insisted on already degenerating into sloppy snogs and raucous sex stories before Louis had even properly sat down with his beer. It’s barely past two a.m., and he’s already seen Liam give Zayn’s cousin a truly cringe-worthy lap dance, seen Harry lick Marmite off of Caroline Flack’s collarbone and heard Pixie Geldof recount a truly horrifying incident involving a broken penis and a visit to A &E.

 _Let’s have some people over tonight,_ Harry had muttered sleepily over a game of FIFA in their flat this morning, harmless as anything as Louis put a brew down next to him. Then they’d sent some texts, ordered some pizzas and let everything get horribly, horribly out of hand.

And now Louis’s alone in Harry’s walk-in wardrobe with Nicholas Fucking Grimshaw, the door shut behind them and nowhere near enough space between them. He doesn’t know how many minutes are left on the clock, only that there must be _too fucking many_ , and Nick won’t stop _looking_ at him, and Louis feels everything inside him is on literal, actual fire. He should’ve known better than to allow any of this.

“So you’ve been very acrobatically avoiding me,” Nick says, running a hand through his stupid quiff. His ridiculous bracelets jangle noisily in the muted silence. “Which has been charming.”

Louis bites down on his lip and digs his nails into the side of his bicep. “No more than usual.”

“You’re also a shit liar.”

Another burst of laughter comes from the living room, shrill and loud. Louis can’t help but think they’re all laughing at him, stuck in here with Nick. They aren’t, they can’t be, he hasn’t given any of them reason to suspect anything. That said, he’s very carefully not thinking about why Pixie dared him to bring Nick in here, why Nick gave her a long, strange look before getting off the floor to join him. “Did you plan this?”

“No,” Nick says sharply. “I don’t have to force people into confined spaces to spend time with me.”

“I find that hard to believe.”

“You know,” Nick starts, and Louis’s stomach swoops immediately at his tone. “I can’t think of anything better for your precious reputation than being trapped in a literal, actual closet with me.”

“Shut up,” Louis says weakly. “It’s a wardrobe.”

“Whatever you wanna call it, mate, you’re the one stuck in it.”

Louis takes a steadying breath and turns his head. “You don’t know anything about me, you self-righteous cunt.”

“Really?” Nick taunts, lowering his voice and leaning in like he’s about to share a secret. “Because I know what you sound like with my hand down your—”

Louis flushes so hard he’s surprised he doesn’t burst a blood vessel. “ _Shut the actual bloody fuck up._ ”

Nick arches an eyebrow, biting his bottom lip like he’s stifling a smile, like any of this is even remotely funny. “Are we just never going to acknowledge it, then?”

“Nothing to acknowledge,” Louis mutters, looking down at Harry’s ridiculous collection of try-hard shoes. He wouldn’t mind lobbing each and every single one of them at Nick’s face. “Nothing.”

“Except for how we had sex.”

“No, we didn’t.”

“Yes, we—“

“You pulled me off in a pub toilet while I was blind with the devil’s drink,” Louis hisses, his voice sounding more strained than it should, “and then you humped my leg like a slobbering dog until you came in your trousers.”

“Oh look,” Nick breathes gleefully, raising his hands to do fucking _jazz hands_. “ _Sex_.”

Louis’s so tense he’s almost shaking with it. He bites down on the inside of his cheek and digs his nails deeper into his biceps, staring hard at the floor. “That’s _not_ sex. No wonder you can’t keep a boyfriend.”

“It’s not not-sex,” Nick insists, his voice going unexpectedly soft. He tips forward again, not quite leaning into Louis’s space but very nearly threatening to. It makes the hair on the back of Louis’s neck stand up, makes his stomach twist up even worse, makes his palms sweat.

“It was a mistake, is what it was. I’m sure you must get that a lot.”

“ _You’re_ the one who kissed me,” Nick says softly, his bracelets jangling again. “ _You’re_ the one who pulled me into the—”

The urge to throw things at him intensifies— there’s an enticingly heavy-looking scented candle perched on a dresser behind him. “Like I said, mistakes. I make them. I’m twenty, I’m supposed to. _You’re_ old enough to know better.”

“Casual ageism. Cute.”

“Fuck off, you’re a wrinkly old—”

“You’re being terrible because you think it’ll make me piss off. Newsflash: I’ve got more stamina than that.”

“Not from what I remember,” Louis says, and then blushes furiously at the sudden catch in Nick’s breath. “Fuck, not. _Don’t_. Shut up.”

“It was hot,” Nick says defensively, his voice going oddly soft again. “It was hot and unexpected and nice and it— it was _hot,_ Lou. I’m not going to apologise for getting off on it.”

 _Lou_. As if he has any right. Louis’s cheeks feel like they’re going to catch fire. “Shut the fuck up.”

“It’s fine if you don’t want to do it again,” Nick says, looking at Louis as Louis resolutely looks away. Louis’s gut is burning with terror and shame and that _other_ thing he won’t name. “You can just say so, you don’t need to ignore me or be a twat about it.”

“Shut up.”

“It’s also fine if you _want_ to do it again—”

Nick’s quicker than Louis would’ve given him credit for, Harry’s glittery Chelsea boots ricocheting off the wall of the wardrobe as Nick deftly ducks out of the way. He accidentally knocks a few vintage silky disasters off their hangers, Louis’s vision temporarily obscured by gracefully falling poncy fabrics until— 

The breath leaves Louis’s lungs in one sudden woosh as Nick manhandles him back against the wall and pins his arms over his head. Louis tries not to get immediately, desperately hard at the feel of Nick’s strong fingers around his wrists, Nick’s damp breath against his jaw, Nick’s hips flush against his stomach. Louis should knee him in the bollocks and make a run for it, but somehow he just... doesn’t, his heart slamming against his rib cage as his gaze settles on Nick’s red mouth.

“Louis,” Nick breathes, his mouth mere inches from Louis’s own. He’s _so_ close, close enough that Louis could tilt his chin up and fuck this all up even worse. “It’s _okay_ if you wanted to do it again.”

“Shut up,” Louis begs. “ _Please_.”

Nick’s eyes drop to Louis’s mouth, his tongue darting out to wet his own lips. His fingers slacken slightly around Louis’s wrists, his body slouched so they’re eye-level. “It’s okay, I promise.”

Louis swallows thickly. “Think you’ve got me all figured out, don’t you?”

“I don’t know,” Nick whispers, glancing down at where their bodies are pressed together. The pressure makes Louis feel dizzy all over, all the blood in his body rushing to all the wrong places. “Don’t I?”

“I’m not fucking bent,” Louis says weakly, breathlessly, trying not to rub up against him. He’s sweating already, shaking, trying desperately to stay in control of himself. He’s pretty sure he’s not the only one who’s hard. “This isn’t— that. It was a mistake. You’re fucking horrible.”

Nick’s biting the corner of his lip, looking between Louis’s eyes with an unreadable expression. Louis can’t tell if he’s about to kiss him or storm out of there. “God,” Nick says, flattening his hands until they’re sliding against Louis’s clammy palms. “You’re such a twat.”

“Fuck you,” Louis mutters. He’s so fucking hard where he’s pressed up against Nick, so desperately, recklessly, humiliatingly turned on. He closes his eyes when Nick’s long fingers slip between his own, somehow more intimate than Nick’s erection pressed up against him. “You’re worse.”

“Lou,” Nick breathes, pressing his forehead against Louis’s temple. His breath smells like wine and cigarettes and gum. “It’s okay. I promise.”

It’s not, Louis knows it isn’t. He hates this part of himself, the part that’s all twisted up and desperate and shameful, the part of him that could ruin everything else if it got out. Hates that Nick can get inside his head like this, that he can make everything inside Louis feel like it’s on actual fire, that he can make Louis’s blood rush like nothing else. Hates that he can’t just get a fucking handle on himself, like everyone else around him seems able to. “You just want to hump my leg again.”

“No,” Nick whispers, bringing one hand down to stroke Louis’s jaw. Louis’s eyelids flutter shut without his say-so, all his defense mechanisms failing. It would be so easy to curl the fingers of his free hand around the back of Nick’s neck, to pull him closer. “Was going to ask if I could kiss you.”

Louis lets out a shaky breath, fragile and strangled. “Nick.”

And Nick— Nick’s right there, his stupid flouncy shirt unbuttoned enough that Louis can see his fuzzy chest hair, his stupid quiff wilting into his earnest eyes, his lips bitten red and inviting, his hands warm and sure against Louis’s skin, and— it would be so easy to just let him. “C’mon, Lou. Say yes.”

“I—” Louis says accidentally, instead of _yes_ or _please_ or _Nick, god, take me to bed and hold my face and kiss me until the sun comes up._ He leans into the millimeter of space separating them, pressing his forehead against Nick’s, letting the dark and quiet make him brave for once.

Nick’s thumb catches on his bottom lip, his long, careful fingers curling around Louis’s jaw, and Louis lets his eyelids flutter shut as he—

A shrill, sudden shriek of laughter from the other room rips him out of his reverie and sends panic tearing through him. He shoves at Nick before he realises what he’s doing, harder than he means to, his forearms slamming against Nick’s exposed collarbones and his face flushing a deep, humiliated red.

Nick shrinks back against the wall opposite him, his hands fleeing from Louis’s body like he’s been burnt. It takes everything in Louis not to follow him, to chase his touch, to beg him for it, to say the right things for once.

Louis can barely look at him, but Nick’s staring back, open-mouthed and frowning, one hand soothing where Louis struck him.

“Should get back out there,” Nick says after an impossible moment that stretches for ages, after it’s become clear Louis isn’t going to say anything at all. He pushes off of the wall and righting his clothes. “Closets make me claustrophobic, been a while since I needed one.”

Louis’ chest tightens dangerously, shame coiling tight inside him. “It’s a wardrobe,” he says again, his voice brittle. His hands are shaking, but he can’t bring himself to reach for him. “ _Nick_.”

Nick rubs a hand over his face, shaking his head as he turns to leave. “Whatever you want to call it, mate.”

“Wait,” Louis breathes, madness sinking back down and terror clawing its way back up, glancing past him at the door separating their little secret from the outside world. He wants to beg him not to leave, wants to beg for him so much more than just _not leaving_ , but he can’t make his mouth work. “You won’t like— _tell_.”

Nick stops, one hand on the door handle, bowing his head for one long, terrible moment. “Promise,” he says quietly. He opens the door, letting in a sliver of light and a rush of noise. “I’ll go first. You— you come out when you’re ready.”

The door shuts behind Nick with a quiet click, and Louis just lets it.

**Author's Note:**

> [tumblr post](http://jiksax.tumblr.com/post/172549515719/fic-use-you-as-a-warning-sign)
> 
> Title from ["I Found" by Amber Run.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yj6V_a1-EUA)


End file.
